


death (and all his friends)

by differentdiff



Category: Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Introspection, Kinda, i keep having thoughts about mortality bc of this game and so i wrote this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-12 04:07:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29628846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/differentdiff/pseuds/differentdiff
Summary: Zagreus has never been able to fully shed the guilt of slaying living beings.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 19





	death (and all his friends)

**Author's Note:**

> based on the dialogue between zag and achilles that (i think) happens after u first get to the temple of styx where zag tells him abt how , up to that point , he had never killed any living things (which was also when i realised they were living things and was like o . )
> 
> i couldn't sleep so i wrote this .... not sure if it makes a whole lotta sense but i think if zagreus WERE th god of life and blood , he would prolly think abt these things so ..... yea
> 
> also idk when exactly in the game this is ? like ... mayb post-epilogue but in a "i'm only able to write abt this bc i've seen so many spoilers but not necessarily actual gameplay and so i know the ending+epilogue but i haven't finished the game" way ..... anyway pls enjoy despite the vague time period lol
> 
> read th notes at th end for a very extensive self explanation lol

While it’s easy to remind himself that the satyrs and vermin in the Temple of Styx are always trying to kill him, Zagreus has never been able to fully shed the guilt of slaying living beings.

Everything he’s fought in Hades is more or less immortalized by death. The enemies and foes that meet Zagreus’ hand always come back, just as Zagreus does himself when they manage to overpower him. The shades he meets and recognises are all okay being dead, apart from any emotional strife they might have, and some even thrive being employed under his father. Death is the norm, death is eternal, death is (quite literally) Zagreus’ friend. It is as inescapable to Zagreus as it is to any mortal.

Still, he can’t shake the dark feeling that comes with taking lives.

He had asked Achilles about this feeling when he first got to the Temple of Styx — as he always has when something like this troubles him — and Achilles had given Zagreus justification. Zagreus kills in self defence, and, unlike these ill-willed satyrs and vermin and other such mortal foes, Zagreus has an ultimate goal to reach. The ends justify the means, as it were. 

But, Zagreus thinks when he surfaces from the Pool of Styx soon after that conversation, sometimes the ends are not met. He fails multiple times to escape — to meet his ultimate goal — and that… does that justify all the mortals he kills?

Well, there is also the self-defence aspect. That much is true; it’s not that Zagreus is bloodthirsty, it’s just that he has no other choice when satyrs are spitting poison darts every time they see him, or when tiny vermin bite at his flamed feet as soon as they burrow out of the ground. And, the nature of Hades is if Zagreus didn’t kill all the foes he meets in any one chamber, he wouldn’t be able to move on to the next chamber. Death is as much the currency of the Underworld as the obols are for Charon’s services.

Still, Zagreus kills. 

And Achilles had killed mortals himself when he was alive. Out of vengeance, not of an ultimate cause. Could he be trusted when justifying the death of others?

No. No, Zagreus trusts Achilles with everything. He sees how much killing had taken a toll on the hero, how much regret Achilles has and his hesitancy to talk about it. Achilles is a killer —  _ was _ a killer — but not by choice. He does not condone killing, but he knows, maybe better than anyone else Zagreus knows, that sometimes it must be done. 

Still… still.

Zagreus has asked others about this, his closest friends. But, just like the Underworld itself, all of his friends understand that death is their business. If mortals didn’t die — if mortals weren’t occasionally  _ killed _ — all of them would be out of a job. Thanatos would have no one to carry over, Meg and her sisters would not have any shades to punish, the House would fall apart and Dusa would have nothing to maintain. Perhaps Hypnos would have some reprieve, seeing as he sleeps all the time anyway, but in the event he has nothing to keep him awake, then perhaps he would never wake up. 

Not only that, but most of his closest friends, like him, are gods — they have a certain flippancy with which they talk about mortals. Humans are so much like them, and yet, because of their expendability — because of their ability to  _ die _ — there is no reason to see them as anything but their shades. The value of mortal lives is reduced to their business potential, which is dependent on their dying. 

But Zagreus can’t reconcile the idea of mortals being mere currency when he’s met so many shades with such…  _ depth _ to their characters. Achilles, of course, his invaluable mentor, and his partner Patroclus, the once gloomy hero of Elysium, had survived a truly heart-wrenching story filled with love and yearning and mistakes and regrets and death. Orpheus, the court musician, and Eurydice, his songwriter and wife, make the most beautiful music in all of Hades, and their songs reflect the deep love they share. Even the champions of Elysium, Theseus and the Bull of Minos, Asterius, share a history and bond Zagreus could not even begin to understand, but he knows their…  _ whatever they have  _ is as true as those of Achilles and Patroclus and Orpheus and Eurydice because he’s  _ seen  _ part of its ups and downs. Not to mention all the shades he can’t recognise by face, like the head broker, or the head chef, or his one fan in the Elysian arena, or all the ones that are stuck doing office work in the administrative chambers, or all the ones that line up to file complaints with his father, or- or- or  _ any _ of them, even the ones that impede Zagreus in all his attempts to escape.

All of these shades had once been living, breathing mortals on the surface. As happy as they are in their afterlives, none of them would be where they are if not for how they had  _ lived _ on the surface. As happy as they are now — as happy as Zagreus is to be able to see all of them (even if Theseus grinds his gears more than any vermin could hope to do) — he cannot deny that they had once been  _ alive _ . 

Zagreus has been to the surface before. He’s seen the snow and its blinding white softness, felt its biting cold. He’s seen the Sun rise above the ocean, reflecting on the water and making it shimmer, the warmth of it soothing all the goosebumps on his skin, the smell of salt in the air. He’s felt grass —  _ real _ grass — beneath his fiery feet, and he’s felt the brush of leaves and twigs and flower petals, and he’s smelled the flowers and trees. Even the eternal rolling fields of Elysium could not compare to the surface, and he can only go so far before he’s taken by the Styx. Most of the shades he’s met had once  _ lived _ there and experienced its wonders all their lives. And yet, they can never see it again. And Zagreus’ job is to make sure of that.

So, Zagreus cannot believe that mortals are merely a means of business. They are, of course, to an immortal like him, but they are not  _ just _ . 

And so, while Zagreus must do what he has to, he cannot completely shed the guilt of killing.

**Author's Note:**

> so . first of all , i might add a second chapter to this in which zagreus asks hermes about this whole idea bc . allow me to explain:
> 
> bc of this game , been kinda obsessed w hermes , and bc of trials of apollo , been kinda obsessed w apollo , and w/o spoiling too much abt ToA (if u are interested , and i hope u are , bc i highly recommend it esp if u've read pjo/hoo it's so good) , it's basically abt the humanization of apollo , who is (to paraphrase a homeric hymn) haughtiest of all the gods , and it's jus like ..... SOOOOO important to me but ofc apollo isn't In hades (at least like ... not as a chara ...... ig he technically appears when zag reaches the surface n sees th sunrise like lololol apparently zagreus only attempts escapes at night so apollo's prolly schnoozin or smth n then he rides th sun chariot through th sky jus when zag pops out and yes ik helios is th sun incarnate or wtv but apollo drives th chariot we'll jus say that and i think u can tell by this point that i'm a lil sleep deprived <3 i apologise for my rambles lol) and hermes is like .... th most charming olympian in this game to me (i also love charon <3 n i like he n hermes' whole lil .... gay lil thing ..... wtv they got goin on) so i'm kinda fixated on him in terms of like the hades bubble
> 
> however , smth that i notice when ppl write abt hermes is that like ...... they make him so human ......... and like i may b writing what is essentially my senior thesis on how hermes and apollo specifically represent the human experience like no other greek god can (yes my brainrot is that bad) but like ....... hermes is a God . and as personable as he is (literal god of diplomacy over here like . his caduceus is a symbol of peace wowza) he's still like ..... pretty removed from human life ........ like while playing today i got a dialogue where he was basically like "humans will believe anything LOL they're so dumb" so it's like hmm .......... AT TH SAME TIME i do agree that like .... out of all the olympians , he prolly has th most contact w/ mortals , being a psychopomp and all (and apparently a bringer of dreams according to some ... his caduceus is also supposed to put ppl to sleep see:the story of argus .... oo la la mr. sandman) so i thot that like .... much like many ppl in this fandom , zagreus might think hermes can understand like what he's thinkin and , well ....... if i decide to write that second chapter , u'll see what i think that interaction would look like :)
> 
> in any case , this has been soooo stuck in my mind that i finally jus had to write it out ..... even tho i have other wips i should b workin on T0T
> 
> if u read all that , holy shit ! thank u for ur tolerance lol , and if u didn't , that's totally understandable i would also prolly skim a note this long if th actual fic was only 1.1k like this one was ........ but thank u for reading th actual fic all th same !!!! i hope u enjoyed , or at least went like "huh ." at it 
> 
> twt: [@differentdiff](https://twitter.com/differentdiff)  
> (my dms are open so if u would wanna hear more abt my thoughts on all this/allow me to rave abt hermes n apollo and also hadesgame charon , then that is an option :D )


End file.
